Union Budget 2011: FM increases tax exemption

While presenting the Union Budget in Lok Sabha, Finance Minister Pranab Mukherjee announced that rate of tax on services will unchanged at 10%. He has added more services to the list.

The service tax net was increased to over 320 services form 117 services currently through either the addition of new services or the expansion of the scope of the existing services.

Here are the latest updates:

• Service tax retained at 10%    
• Direct tax sops to result in Rs 11,500 cr net revenue loss    
• Foreign dividend tax rate cut to 15% for Indian cos    
• Low withholding tax of 5% for notified infra funds    
• Will maintain excise duty at 10%    
• All subsidy continues to be part of planned expenses   
• MAT rate raised from 18% to 18.5%    
• New category for 80 yrs and above, limit is Rs 5 lakh   
• Propose to levy MAT on developers of SEZs    
• Propose to reduce surcharge on corporate tax to 5%    
• FY12 total plan spend at Rs 12.57 lakh crore    
• Qualifying age for senior citizens reduced to 60 vs 65   
  Exemption limit for general tax payers raised to Rs 1,80,000   
• FY12 gross tax receipts at Rs 9.32 lakh crore    
• Revenue deficit estimated at 1.8% in 2011-12    
• FY11 fiscal deficit at 5.1%    
• Fiscal deficit seen at 4.6% for FY12